Where I’d been, I could not recall. Had I fallen asleep? While I didn’t think so, I wasn’t sure I hadn’t, either. I was sure of one thing only, that I’d finally come back to where I belonged, for I’d never before experienced such total peace of mind.

Wherever I’d been, for the time being, I felt at one with myself. I felt as if I’d finally come back to my senses. As tears welled up in my eyes, I recalled what’d happened to me when I went out—I had unexpectedly gotten back in touch with my feelings.

As I sat pondering over my next move, I was pricked by the painful thought that I should have nothing to do with the Navy. Like an expectant mother, I had no conception of the form in which this child would appear when it was born. I knew only that I was a long ways off from giving birth to this new life taking shape within me. Because I wanted it to happen now, I was pricked with the pain I sometimes felt when I didn’t get my way.

Even though I still didn’t know what to do with my feelings towards the Navy, I knew that I could no longer simply ignore them either. Because the soul eventually requires a little action from the body, I had no choice but to do what she asked of me if I wanted to keep myself out of the arms of some whore. Only I didn’t want to have to endure any suffering in the process. Little did I know that labor pain’s a prerequisite for the birth of truth. In spite of the great pain I normally felt as a result of the severe limitations the Navy placed upon my soul, I found great joy in those moments when she was given free rein. In my struggle to find a way out of this maze, I felt as if I were being subjected to a course in behavior modification, to see if I could be prodded into following the orders of a much greater will than my own, that of either She Who Must Be Obeyed or the Great Gray Whore. While I certainly preferred the joy my soul gave me to the pain the Navy inflicted upon her, I’d never realized that new life was taking shape within me, until now. Thus did I resign myself to the task of meeting its needs whenever my soul prevailed upon me to do so.

Because I was low man on the totem pole, I again got stuck with cleaning our compartment, which I wouldn’t have minded so much if my body’d been a little more cooperative. Unchallenged, I quickly became the breeding ground for discontent, which simmered for only so long before it gathered enough steam to force its way into my life as a full-blown underground movement to resist the Navy. Unable to find a more positive direction for my creative energies, was I driven to rebel against the limitations the Navy placed upon my soul.

Unfortunately, I got to play shipfitter for only about a week or so, before I was sent back up to the mess decks to serve three months for “R“ Division, whose turn it was to send someone. Under great protest I went, only to find friends like Greg ’n’ Dink amongst the new faces that greeted me up there. With a little gentle persuasion from them, I decided to give it my best shot, in spite of how unfair it seemed that I should be sent back up to the mess decks so soon after having already served two months up there for First Division.

Upon learning, right before lunch, I was scheduled to stand the afternoon watch, I hurried up to the mess decks, only to find a long line. So I grabbed an orange, to tide me over till dinner, and raced up to the bridge where I was told to relieve the starboard lookout. Once up topside, I was informed by the last watch to keep a sharp lookout for any torpedoes—dummies, that is, of course—headed our way, for we were involved in an antisubmarine warfare exercise with the other ships in the fleet. Having donned the microphone and headset, I quickly scanned the surface of the water with my binoculars. However, I saw nothing that even remotely resembled a torpedo. Instead, I felt as if it were going to be just another one of those long boring watches, I had grown so used to standing by now.

How quickly I found myself sitting out in the middle of the ocean in a rowboat, or daydream, without any means to propel it. Suddenly, from out across the water, I heard a young girl scream for help, as she struggled to keep her head above water. Without thinking, I leapt out of the boat and ran across the surface of the water to save her. Having pulled her from the water, I carried her in my arms, back to the boat. As I stepped into the boat, it dawned on me that I’d just walked on water. Astounded, I put her down in the boat.

“Are you all right?“ I inquired.

“Yes,“ she replied. “I’ll be fine as soon as I catch my breath.“

“What’re you doin’ way out here, by yourself?“ I asked.

“I’ve been waiting for you to save me,“ she replied.

“I don’t understand,“ I declared. “Who are you, anyway?“

“I’m the little girl you left to drown some years ago,“ she answered. “Don’t you remember? You told your high school counselor about me.“

“Why that was just a story I made up,“ I responded, “to help me explain what I was feelin’ at the time.“

“No,“ she screamed. “It really happened—you left me to drown, choosing instead, to go off ’n’ play with your self.“

Momentarily struck speechless by the truth of her words, I wondered how what’d started out as make-believe could end up being so real.

“May I have a bite of your orange?“ she asked after a long pause.

“What orange?“ I muttered, for I still couldn’t believe all of this was really happening.

“The orange you have in your pocket,“ she replied.

“Of course!“ I exclaimed as I grabbed the orange and started to peel it. “How’d ya know I had an orange?“

“I’ve been waiting for you to peel it,“ she replied with a smile.

As I did so, I tossed the peelings over the side, completely unaware that, in reality, I was bombarding the Captain and the Officer of the Deck with them.

Suddenly, I heard the Captain scream, “Why hasn’t the starboard watch reported the torpedo approaching the Davidson off the starboard bow? I want that man relieved of his watch, immediately, goddamn it!“

I looked at the little girl in the boat, as she smiled at me with the most sympathetic look on her face. “You set me up for this, didn’t you?“ I demanded to know before she vanished.

As the rowboat sank beneath the surface of the water, I realized she had just torpedoed me again. If these were the sort of tricks the little sprite was going to play on me, no wonder I had been so reluctant to rescue her in the past.

The first person I met was Greg. From Los Angeles, he was the gregarious magnet that drew us all together. In build, he reminded me of a lanky turtle without its shell, for from out of his rounded shoulders protruded a long skinny neck on top of which sat a head he always held cocked slightly forward and off to one side. He stood his ground, though, against the taunts he incurred around his slow, deliberate movements and somewhat effeminate mannerisms. Gifted with an ability to draw, he rose above the herd mentality of his tormentors by drawing satirical caricatures of them. In his hate for the Navy, he regularly smoked marijuana and, on occasion, dropped acid with another shipmate to escape the pain of it all.

Shortly thereafter, Greg introduced me to Harold, a rabbity-looking fella from Collinsville, Illinois. Of slight build, Harold was a very warm and gentle person, who approached others with his nose twitching as nibbled on one of his fingers or puffed on a cigarette, like a novice smoker. With his big watery brown eyes fixed elsewhere, on some distant worry, he often had little to say. When he did, he never spoke an unkind word about anyone, even the lifers. For unlike Greg ’n’ I, his dislike of the Navy had been tempered by the more satisfying position, he held, as a clerk typist in the ship’s office. Besides, he had a wife and a newborn baby back home to think about. For he had apparently gotten her pregnant before they were married—before he was ready to assume that much responsibility in his life.

The next person, I met, was Marty, a wild and high-spirited stallion, who would soon prove much more difficult to keep corralled than either a boxed turtle or a caged rabbit. For he would go on to become one of the most outspoken members of the crew beside myself. While he could never accept such a position for himself, he deeply respected the stand I had taken against the Navy and stood by me to the very end.

From a tough working class neighborhood in Baltimore, Maryland, Marty never cowered from speaking his mind and challenging the other members of the crew. For he hated the Navy and the animallike behavior of the lifers. A hard worker, he always followed orders, in spite of the abuse he suffered at the hands of some of the lifers for expressing his views. And even though Marty stood up for what he believed, he always acted within the confines of the law he felt bound to obey. As an electrician’s mate did he short-circuit many a lie the lifers lived by. An answer to a prayer, Marty was more than a like-minded companion, for he was another voice in the desert.

And even though I didn’t know it at the time, I was the missing link, that hypothetical intermediate between the myth of man and his animal ancestry. Indeed, I was the next great step in the evolution of mankind, which so many of us long to see and yet bitterly detest when we do.

“I hope I’m not disturbing you,“ I replied.

“If you were, I’d have asked ya to leave,“ he said. “As it is, I feel the need for some good company and a bit of stimulating conversation.“

Struck by not only his honesty but also his impeccable dress, an obviously freshly pressed set of tailor-made dungarees, I asked him, “Did ya get in trouble today?“

“Nah,“ he answered, “I’m too short. With less than a week to go on this godforsaken can, they (meaning the lifers) can’t touch me.“

I was deeply saddened by the news that he’d be leaving so soon. Even though he wasn’t as warm and vibrant as Van, I nonetheless took an immediate liking to him. For I experienced this young rebellious intellectual from Boston, Massachusetts, as a godsend. Envious of his impending discharge, I wished I were in his shoes instead.

“For four long years,“ he continued, “I’ve struggled against becoming an animal like the rest of these bastards. Next week when I walk off this ship for the last time, I’ll have prevailed.“

“I know the feeling,“ I interjected.

“From the first day of my enlistment,“ he rejoined, “they drummed the idea into my head that I had joined this outfit for one reason only: to fight for my country. But they lied to me, for I ended up spending four long years fightin’ to save my ass from them.

“Don’t believe a word of what the lyin’ vultures say, for they prey upon human flesh with talons made of lies. Resist the temptation to become one of them. And whatever you do, don’t let them rob you of the most precious gift you have, your humanity, for the wraiths will claw away at it until all that remains is the shadow of what was once you.“

Dear Butch,
Sounds like you don’t think too much of the Navy. I think it’s because of all the rules and regulations. You haven’t had many restrictions put on you in a long time. It’s going to take a lot of getting used to. The only thing you can do is to make the best of it. Otherwise, you’ll go crazy. You’re never going to be completely satisfied with the job you’re doing—that’s human nature. Make the time you have to spend in the Navy one you’ll never forget. Remember, life is what you make of it. Whatever job you’re doing, do it well, even if you don’t like it. You have no choice. Remember, it’s only temporary.
Love,
Mary

Now I felt totally misunderstood. While I sometimes doubted my sanity, I certainly didn’t want to become some socially accepted, schizophrenic beast like M. For I saw the rules ’n’ regulations, all the pomp ’n’ plume of the military, as a facade shrewdly constructed long ago to hide the true nature of this beast from the consciousness of the general public. With the beast so well concealed, how could I ever get Mary to see military service as the bloody poison which transforms the young Jekylls of this country into hideous Hydes, so that they, who were once men, can kill without feeling, consciousness of the soul or a conscience. How could I convey to her what has happened to the M.‘s of this country? How could I tell her about the Hyde who lurked within my own body and periodically dragged me down to hell? And lastly, how could I ever convince her that it is the discipline of the soul rather than of the military, which ultimately transforms the beast?

Why even the mess decks had its share of seedy rogues, of whom the worst was a little wiry, dark complected guy named B., who cussed incessantly in that same gruff gravelly voice. Just watching him cook was enough to make me sick. Having wiped the sweat from his brow with his finger, he’d often fling it into the food he was preparing. Or whenever he cleared his throat or blew his nose, he’d occasionally spit the phlegm or blow the snot onto the grill and mix it into the food he was frying. Once he even beat off on a raw steak, which he then threw onto the grill to be cooked and served to the crew along with the others. In my opinion, the dude was crazy, and yet he was greatly admired by those around him for his audacity.

For my part, I absolutely refused to eat whenever he cooked. How else was I to make the best of such memorable experiences? If I reported him, who’d believe me? It’d be his word against that of a f___-up. How could I ever make the best of anything in this hellhole?

By now, my discomfort with the Navy had grown to such an extent that I began to wonder what my body, in its more infinite wisdom, was trying to tell me. As the underground resistance to my life in the Navy had spread throughout my body, I found myself feeling more like a stubborn mule that refused to budge no matter how much I cajoled or prodded it, than I did the human being that’d gotten it into this mess. O how I wished I could see what it saw in its earthy wisdom. But alas, I seemed hopelessly trapped in an inescapable morass or nightmare, from which not even I could free my own ass.

Although the mule has received a bum rap as being a dumb animal or “dumb ass“, like the jackass who sired it, more often than not, it takes after its mother, the mare who gave birth to it, in the way it generally behaves. However, if it senses a command’d shove it beyond the boundaries of appropriate behavior for a mule, it’ll quickly revert to behaving like an ass. Seeing such orders as a lie to be resisted with every wily trick at its disposal, thus will it play dumb, ignore the command, or refuse to budge, choosing instead to sit down on its haunches and bray at our stupidity while we—with our superior intellect—stumble off into the very nightmares our more asinine instincts refuse to go.

And so did I assume a more mulish role onboard the ship by playing dumb, ignoring commands or pretending to misunderstand such orders. Whenever I caved into the demands of the lifers and tried to lead an exemplary seaman’s life, I’d grow increasingly agitated. As soon as I returned to my mulish escapades, I found happiness again. Subjected to a form of behavior modification by my mule, I quickly learned to pay closer attention to his wily ways. Like the mule, then, I could see that this life was not for me, that it was out of bounds for me—against my truest instincts. But I couldn’t see any further than the end of my nose or the instinctive reactions of a dumb ass, for unlike my mother, or the more marish part of me, I was incapable, at the time, of verbalizing what I felt.

At that point, I was abruptly pulled back from the void and temporarily reunited with what I was painfully feeling when a third class gunner’s mate questioned me. “You don’t like the Navy, do ya Drury?“

“No, I don’t,“ I replied rather feebly as the sights and sounds of the present moment came crashing back into my awareness.

Suddenly, the gun mount began to swivel about, jerking back and forth with a whining sound, before it settled upon a particular position. The cannon too, was raised, then lowered into position for firing. And with that, several rounds were fired off in quick succession at a small island called Kahoolawe, the Navy’s firing range.

While the gun mount recoiled around the deafening sound of each round, I found myself getting sick from the combination of the smell of gunpowder, the gyrations of the gun mount and the ship’s bobbing up ’n’ down, like a cork, as it stood dead in the water. How easily did I slip back into my stupor to escape the intolerableness of the moment—the intensity of the screaming in my head and pain in my chest. How long I remained mentally and emotionally blacked out, I do not know since I didn’t come to, until sometime later, down in the compartment. What had transpired in the interim, I could not recall at the time.

Only now do I recollect having had a fantasy in which I was washed up onto the shore of some strange island as the sole survivor of a shipwreck. How long I lay there passed out upon the beach, I do not know. At some point, I vaguely remember feeling the soft hand of a woman caressing my face. But I could not see her, for I was unable to open my eyes, which had swollen shut as a result of their having been overly exposed to salt water. When I did finally manage to open my eyes, I found myself standing down in the compartment, looking into the mirror that hung there. And at first, I could’ve sworn I saw no reflection of my self in the mirror. In fact, I was shocked when I actually felt an urge to walk back into the mirror, or through the looking glass, so to speak. At that point, I saw my reflection and began to hear the sounds of other people milling about me.

I easily debunked that myth, for I was a man with lots of feeling. Only I just didn’t like the way I felt, the constant ache inside my heart, which I had mistakenly attributed, at the time, to the great distance that separated me from my girlfriend, Mary. Having felt, at such times, as if I were standing outside of my body, terribly removed from what I was really feeling, I realized my pain had more to do with the great distance that separated me from my soul than it had, with my separation from Mary, as the latter reality merely reflected the former truth. Now I understood why I had so much more feeling for Mary than I had for what I wanted to do with my life, for it was she who had captured the image of my soul.